Weird Ass Holidays

It has been a strange holiday season here in Casa Amos. I'll say that this year Little A was much more aware of the goings on than he was last Christmas. Any drive after dark became a tour of the local Christmas light displays with our guide gleefully exclaiming, "Christmas over there! Christmas over there!" at every decorated yard. He can now also identify the infant in the manger as Baby Jesus and tell us that Baby Jesus' mother is "Maawee". At the sight of wrapped gifts, Little A will also inform us that it's "present time". He got a lot of great gifts, like new additions to his cast of Cars characters, a large stuffed (and ridable) horse he's named Seabiscuit, and a leather jacket.

This past week, however, has also been an exceedingly trying one. A narsty cold swept through the family right before Christmas, affecting Little and Papa A pretty badly. As a result of his sickness and the general excitement of the season, Little A decided for the first time in 23 months to stop sleeping through the night. In fact, he's decided to awaken several times throughout the night, a trend which has kick-started Momma A's long dormant insomnia. I think I was averaging about three hours of sleep per night during Christmas week. By Friday, I realized that if I didn't get a good night's sleep by the weekend I would probably start hallucinating and possibly offer my son as a sacrifice to the Sandman.

Sunday morning we were greeted with complaints from Little A about hurting ears, and so we spent a few hours in Patient First for a prescription of amoxicillin. Good times, y'all. Good times.

The same cold has also put Adrian completely on his ass with raging headaches, congestion, and a hacking cough. So Momma A's been working overtime on the nursemaid duties, all on very little sleep.

Needless to say, I felt like I was slowly losing my mind.

Last night we scrapped plans to enjoy the calamity of the ball rise in Carytown and have a low-key evening of dinner and a movie (I Am Legend which I liked more than I thought I would. Will Smith was quite captivating and some of the imagery of an abandoned New York was stirring. But the last third was weak and yes, the CGI sub-par.). We returned home with Little A tucked into bed, and I started pulling laundry out of the dryer only to discover that in my haste to juggle the needs of a demanding toddler with finishing the laundry, I had accidentally tossed my lovely sapphire blue J Crew sweater into the dryer. My wool-blend-dry-flat-no-heat-dry-clean-recommended sweater. It was ruined.

This mishap stirred up all my frustrations and resentments of the last few weeks and prompted a tirade of my misgivings about parenthood. That having a child was the biggest mistake of my life, that I have lost all my independence, my happiness comes in tiny inconsistent spurts, I feel like hired hand paid in room and board, and that in my child's eyes, I could honestly be interchanged with any female willing to feed and play with him and make sure he gets to watch his beloved Sesame Street tape.

I went to bed angry and depressed only to be awakened less than two hours later by Little A having a coughing fit that surprisingly didn't wake him up but did guarantee I'd get only a few hours sleep.

Today we opted to hang at home, watch the Rose Bowl parade and lots of football, and wrestle about the den. Adrian thinks he is on the mend, and Little A seems to be perking up. Tonight we had the traditional Southern New Year's Day meal of hoppin' john and rice along with chicken and greens. Hopefully I'll get a solid six hours of sleep tonight.

Happy New Year everyone.

Here's hoping 2008 starts off better than 2007 ended. I'm staring down the barrel of the Terrible Two's and not liking the looks of it.